"Before we got engaged, I gave
him "the quiz." I told him I wanted
to share housework and child rearing, and
he agreed. We touched base again before
deciding to get pregnant. We've always assumed
we would split all the responsibilities
and we always have." Rebecca Powell,
web site designer who works three days a
week, whose entrepreneur husband works three
days a week and shares the care of their
children.

WE'RE TALKING ABOUT A LIFETIME PLAN

Like every other relationship, marriage
involves negotiation. Yes, love can make
a huge difference, and even provide some
leverage in "discussions," if
you prefer, with your mate. But don't kid
yourself. Even when dating, people do all
sorts of bargaining, both directly and indirectly.
Before getting engaged, most couples negotiate
about what their relationship and any resulting
marriage will look like, and even whether
to get married.

At one time families arranged marriages
and haggled over dowries. The betrothed
had little or no input. Today things have
become more complicated. We no longer have
any crystal clear rules, even for the first
date. Before the women's movement, men were
supposed to make the first overture. Now
women can, and do, ask men out.

As the courtship progresses, couples might
negotiate over whether to sleep together,
whether to have an exclusive relationship,
whether they will see each other all weekend
or just on Saturday night, what restaurant
to go to, what appetizer to share, whether
to get dessert, or what movie to see. Every
day, they will make decisions together as
to what to do and what not to do. At any
turning point, a romantic union can go in
different directions, all of which require
reconciling each person's interests and
desires.

Modern parenthood also forces new choices
about the use of time. Changing from two
individuals with two jobs and no babies
to a family requires give and take from
both partners. At one point, the rules for
transformation had little elasticity. Women
who got pregnant had to quit their jobs
(if they had one). End of story. Now, we
can negotiate everything.

In fact, parents sometimes have difficulty
seeing anything other than the bargaining
aspect of their relationship. Who's going
to have a professional or a social life?
How will they pool their efforts at home?
Who's going to come home early to relieve
the baby-sitter? Who's going to call the
baby-sitter? Who will take Susie to her
much loved ballet lessons even though you
both know she will never be a ballerina?
Who can stay home with a sick child? Such
is the stuff of life with kids.

A variety of factors will impact the resolution
of these large and small issues, only one
of which is love. Rhona Mahony, the author
of Kidding Ourselves: Breadwinning, Babies,
and Bargaining Power, explains that
in marriage

Bargaining power is a big element of who
gets their way. Relative income, relative
earning potential, social status, physical
size and strength, remarriageabilty, remaining
years of fertility, and emotional attachment
to the children all play a role. Men have
more of all of these attributes than women,
except for emotional attachment to the children.

Of course, marriage provides incentives
to deal fairly with one another that do
not exist in other situations. We're talking
about two people who love each other, after
all. Parents share a common goal, which
can lead to outcomes a "winner-take-all"
negotiator would never accept. Yet, looking
at parents' interactions through the prism
of negotiating theory proves a surprisingly
effective way to understand what goes on
in marriage or partnership. The principles
of bargaining provide the tools to change
the status quo.

BEFORE YOU PASS GO,
RECOGNIZE YOU ARE IN IMPORTANT TALKS

Think I'm de-romanticizing and underestimating
the power of love? Let's look at how a woman
who doesn't know she's negotiating might
fare. Then we'll see how a woman who understands
she can bargain does in comparison.

Mary Clayton is an economics professor and
mother of a six-month-old. She has taken
a year's sabbatical, wants her husband Mark
to work flexibly so she can resume her career.

Before she stopped taking birth-control
pills, Mary told Mark that if she got pregnant,
she would work part time, or even stay home.
The couple had been married for a year and
a half, and both lavished much time on their
careers. They cooked elaborate dinners together
a few times a week, and took part in many
activities and friendships, sometimes together
and sometimes apart. Mary recalls:

I had no earthly reason for saying I might
stay home. I'd never been around babies.
I guess I felt working full time wouldn't
leave enough time for our baby. And that
maybe motherhood would change me into another
kind of person.

I didn't expect him to go and rely on what
I said, though. It was just talk. I was
thinking out loud, more than anything.

Without realizing it, Mary had negotiated
with Mark to stop using birth control. In
some way, Mark had understood he was in
a bargaining situation. He wanted to continue
to work hard, and thought they had agreed
having a baby would enable him to do so.
As a result, it surprised him when Mary
sought his presence at home after Jeffrey's
birth. He says:

She told me she was ready to have children.
I wasn't. The idea scared me. Then she said
she would either work part time or stay
home and I would support the family. Since
I was about to move to the next level at
my job, I agreed to go along with the plan.
I just assumed it would all get worked out
without my being involved in a major way.

Mary made a number of errors that later
put her in a situation she disliked. To
start with:

· She didn't prepare in advance,
think hard about what she wanted, or do
any research.
· She didn't understand she was in
a negotiation.
· She didn't realize her statements
would have an impact on her future.
· She thought love would cause everything
to come out all right and that her partner
would support whatever she decided do in
the future, even if it differed from her
initial expectations.

Mary did no research before formulating
her position about having a child, one of
the biggest decisions she will ever make.
This is a huge no-no in negotiation, whatever
the context. True, Mary felt a strong biological
urge to have a baby. However, removed as
we are from a state of nature, if we want
to best enjoy our long lives in civilization,
we must look into our options before deciding
whether, when, and how to have children.
The women's movement and science have given
us a new opportunity. We can now choose
the lives we want to lead.

Rebecca Powell understood all this very
well. A Berkeley graduate and professional
activist, she had steeped herself in the
history of feminism. After meeting Darrell
Smith at a friend's wedding, she returned
to California and he to New York. Before
she agreed to see him again, she made sure
Darrell would go along with her planned
future. Rebecca states:

I knew women who got all tied up in knots
over the choice of whether to work or stay
home. I figured whoever I married would
split the duties. That way, it wouldn't
be all this or all that. I knew I wanted
to take care of a kid and to work. I wanted
to share everything. I didn't want anything
broken down by gender.

Darrell hadn't thought about these issues
much. He had a close relationship with his
mother and three sisters, which made him
view women as equals. In the full flush
of romantic ardor, he agreed in theory and
even made a commitment to Rebecca's ideals
should the relationship progress as they
thought it would. He says:

I wanted to get married to Rebecca. And
I wanted to have kids. I asked her to make
a huge sacrifice and leave the Bay area
to be with me. She would only move to the
East Coast if she knew I would be the kind
of husband she wanted. I'm an open-minded
person and what she said seemed fair, so
I said, "Okay."

Rebecca laid the groundwork for achieving
the life she desired. In contrast to Mary
Clayton, Rebecca:

knew what she wanted from marriage
on her first date;

· viewed courtship conversation as
a form of negotiation about the future;

Few of us have evolved as far as Rebecca
has. She is the only woman I spoke to who
came up with the idea of "the quiz"
(brilliant idea, by the way; I wish I'd
thought of it). When Rebecca became pregnant,
she and Darrell checked in again with each
other and proceeded with their plan to share
parenting, starting with maternity and paternity
leave. Since their son Mac's birth, they
have both worked part time, each taking
care of their son while the other works.

After she became a mother, Rebecca might
have found she wanted a different arrangement
than she had anticipated. That would have
worked out however, because she had put
herself in a position of strength and could
negotiate a different situation if she changed
her mind. It would be far easier to convince
Darrell Powell to do less childrearing than
he had bargained for than to convince Mark
Clayton to do more than he had bargained
for.

ASK FOR THE WHOLE ENCHILADA

Clearly, women collectively have not negotiated
good deals for themselves. Mothers still
do more, and fathers less, at home and with
their children than women would like. Why
is that? The most important reason is low
aspiration level.

According to negotiations guru Chester L.
Karras, "losers" in negotiations
make substantial unnecessary concessions.
The most important factor in negotiations
is "aspiration level." Those who
ask for more get more. Those who ask for
less get less.

A Karras study demonstrates the importance
of aspiration level. In the study, 120 professional
negotiators bargained over the award in
a mock lawsuit between a drug company and
a man who suffered eye damage after taking
one of the company's products. In one scenario,
the parties had an approximately equal balance
of power. In the other, more legal precedent
supported the plaintiff's claims. The negotiators
with higher aspiration levels won higher
awards, regardless of which fact pattern
they used. Consistent with a large body
of research, those who achieved better results
started out wanting more and ended up with
more.

When dealing with people with high aspirations,
those with low aspirations did poorly. The
negotiators who secured the lowest awards
had always made the largest concession in
any single negotiation. They also tended
to make the first compromise.
Look at our examples once more. Mary Clayton
started out presuming a small effort from
her husband Mark - and she got a small involvement
from him. Mary made all the concessions,
immediately. Mark made none. Is Mark a cruel,
bad person, who doesn't love his wife and
means to oppress her? No. Without thinking
much about it, Mark went along with the
tide, as Mary had tacitly encouraged him
to do.

Rebecca Powell asked for more and she got
a large involvement from Darrell Smith.
Neither she nor Darrell made a concession,
but instead both accommodated their desires
and beliefs. Does this mean Darrell is a
wonderful, good person, who loves his wife
more than Mark Clayton loves his? Not necessarily.
Rebecca asked for something different, used
her strengths in a loving way, and Darrell
responded positively.

Stay-at-home mothers who expect their husbands
to help can also get lots of support. Jennifer,
whose unpaid position as president of a
volunteer humanitarian organization that
takes up hundreds of hours of her time a
year, knew she wanted to stay home with
her children. Unlike Mary Clayton, she also
knew she'd like her husband involved from
the start. Together, Jennifer and her husband,
Joe, decided to share post-baby childcare
and housework chores evenly. During the
nine months she nursed her son Alex, Doug
did more housework and shopping than Jennifer
because:

My philosophy has always been that my husband
can do everything I can do but give birth
and nurse. He never came home and asked
me why I couldn't keep the house clean.
That was his job in the beginning.

Other parents besides professionals, artists,
and the idle rich share childrearing. Deedee
Rivera splits the care of their four children
with her husband, Roberto. She works two
part-time baby-sitting jobs and cleans houses
on the side, mostly during the day. Roberto
serves as banquet manager for a luxury hotel,
working from three in the afternoon to eleven
at night Tuesday through Saturday. Deedee
sometimes brings some or all of her children
to her jobs, but usually Roberto takes care
of them in the late morning and early afternoon.

Though she comes from a Latin American culture
that does not encourage dads' participation,
Deedee made it happen. When I inquired if
she had to ask Roberto to be highly involved,
she laughed: "Of course, I did. Otherwise,
men will just do what they want. He always
helped since the beginning. We talked about
it and realized because of our jobs this
was the way we would have to do it."

This most basic primer on negotiation
explains why women usually don't create
comfortable post-baby roles for themselves.
They become negotiation "losers"
the moment they presume only mothers can
nurture children or that men's time has
more value than women's time does. Women
simply do not demand enough. Granted, this
will come as an unwelcome surprise to husbands
doing all they can within their framework
of understanding. However, raising women's
aspiration levels will make men, women,
and children happier, a "win-win-win"
situation.